79% marginalised people faced hardship caused by Covid-19: Study

About 79 percent marginalised and vulnerable citizens of Bangladesh have experienced financial hardship as their monthly income and expenditure drastically declined due to the Covid-19 pandemic, says a study.

The households were found cutting down food and non-food expenses, taking loans and financial support from private and non-government sources, and also withdrawing their savings to deal with the crisis, it said.

The study conducted by the Citizen’s Platform Bangladesh collecting samples of about 1,600 households across Bangladesh in February 2021 was presented at a virtual event on Thursday.

It covered 10 marginalised groups, including char, haor, coastal, slum, dalit, indigenous, persons with disabilities (PWD), migrants and micro, small and medium enterprises (MSME).

Of the 79 percent of households’ exposure to financial hardship due to Covid-19, thy study found that 93.2 percent of MSME households suffered the financial hardship, followed by 88.1 percent of PWD, 87.3 percent of slum and 86 percent of coastal households.

Income declined 21 percent in char, 20 percent in migrants and 20.1 percent in MSME households, it said.

About coping through borrowings, it also revealed that the loan was taken by 75 percent of MSMEs, 61 percent of coastal, 54 percent of haor and 51 percent of dalit and 50 percent of slum households to tackle the COVID-19 crisis.

About 78 percent households said that they did not recover yet from the financial hardship.